With Resignation

There is a letter on the desk.

God’s Spokesperson approaches. His robes swish around his blue ankles like the mist at the bottom of a tumultuous waterfall. The office around him is one that is infrequently visited. It’s not off limits but simply feared.

It is furnished with dark wood and no windows. Tomes line the walls. There is only one chair—before which the letter is neatly fixed—and it’s more of a throne than a chair. Angels with eyes covering their bodies are carved into the rich wood arch. The leather of the seat and back of the chair shines.

The Spokesperson rounds the table. He carefully takes in its contents—an unpainted clay cup that holds several pens of various styles from centuries past; a stack of plain white stationery paper and envelopes; a glass paperweight in the shape of a fruit with little air bubbles for seeds; a disposable white lighter; two skulls preserved in alarmingly pristine condition; a set of small, circular glasses with silver frames; and one silver spoon with streaks that imply it’s been used and forgotten.

Then, there is the letter. It is written on the plain, white paper.

The Spokesperson sits.

A red feather quill rests across the letter as if it was not yet finished when its writer had gotten up to answer a needy call.

The Spokesperson moves the quill.

Dear Reader,

It’s time.

As if that was all that needed to be written, the Spokesperson understands exactly what is meant by so few words. Even in the beginning, God was resigned to this fate. In the end, He will have to destroy all that He created. It is something that all the angels—including the Spokesperson himself—know that God is not necessarily looking forward to. Still, it is a necessary destruction; it is inevitable.

That’s when the Spokesperson feels the change. Somewhere in the distance, there is a great rumble, and the foundations of Heaven itself shake. A rupture follows—a crack that rattles the clay cup and pens inside. One of the skulls rolls onto the floor.

The Spokesperson rushes out. In the distance, where the white landscape stretches out and where buildings tuck into hazy mists, there is a blast of fire. Wings of flame flare upward. A pillar rises from the fire, and a fault line of red and embers divide the ground. Heaven’s grounds split open, a crack in Earth’s sky below.

Ashes flit down from Heaven’s sky, and the Spokesperson knows that the Earth is experiencing its first rain of fire. It’s the beginning of the end. It’s time.